CIA makes one of the biggest disclosures ever

The United States’ Central Intelligence Agency has released millions of pages of declassified documents, following a Freedom of Information campaign.

The intelligence organisation made almost 13 million pages of 930,000 documents available to anyone with an internet connection after it was contested they should be available. Before this, the documents were only able to be read when a personal was physically within the CIA building.

Since 1999, the CIA has regularly released its historical declassified records to the standalone CIA Records Search Tool (CREST) system that was only accessible in person at the National Archives Records Administration (NARA) in College Park, Maryland. Moving these documents online highlights the CIA’s commitment to increasing the accessibility of declassified records to the public.

The CREST collection covers a myriad of topics, such as the early CIA history, the Cold War, Vietnam, the Berlin Tunnel project, the Korean War, and the U-2 reconnaissance aircraft. The documents also extensively address developments on terrorism, as well as worldwide military and economic issues.

I am a journalist and author. I am a staff writer at the UK edition of WIRED magazine and in 2015 my book, Freedom of Information: A Practical Guide for UK Journalists, was published. I created FOI Directory in 2012.